Fundamentals Week 12

Cha Cha and nine stroke roll.

I've checked out. The most interesting thing about this week is that I've been playing cha cha in a TD song and didn't know it.

I turned in all the evaluations and told them I was disappointed in the course and wouldn't be taking more.

Fundamentals Week 11

I didn't turn in my assignment for Week 10.

This week is more jazz...swing...and para diddle-diddles. I probably won't turn in this week's lesson either though I read all the materials and watched the videos.

It isn't like me not to turn in assignments for a class...but I guess that I just feel like I'm not getting anything out of turning them in at this point except feeling bad about myself. He gave me a D on the last assignment even though I emailed him and told him how much I was struggling. I'm not taking the class for credit...so the grades are kind of demoralizing since I'm not doing well. I wish that they weren't giving grades...just a "complete/incomplete" would have been better for me. And his comments aren't helpful...amounting essentially to "you are doing it wrong...you need to practice more." Duh. I know that. So turning things in have just become an exercise in stress and feeling bad about myself.

For sure this class didn't turn out the way that I thought it would. I thought I'd be so much further along at the end...but I'm really not. It reminds me of the last time I started lessons and thought I was going to advance so quickly...only to be crippled by the things I was struggling with and having to quit.

It's a strange and delicate balance between accepting where you are and feeling okay with that and working and striving to be better. It isn't lost on me that drumming is a metaphor for all the other things going on in my life right now. But I think that I'm learning that before you can really strive to be better...you have to REALLY accept where you are at. Otherwise no amount of effort will ever feel like enough.

And so I'm giving myself a pass on this class. I'm still taking in the information, but I'm not letting it beat me up. And I'm hoping to get back to a place where drumming is fun again soon rather than having it make me feel bad about myself.

Fundamentals Week Ten

Here we are at week ten...jazz. Two more weeks to go. I've barely looked at this week's assignment. I can't wait for this class to be over.

Which isn't to say that the entire experience hasn't been valueable. Certainly it has. One thing I've learned is that there is a delicate balance between challenging and demoralizing. Not challenging enough = boring and you quit. Too challenging = you feel incompetant and quit.

And this is perhaps why CJ has been such a wonderful experience...it takes some effort and there's always tweaking improvements to be made (and the potential to fall down on your face at any moment)...but it isn't TOO hard. It is possible to accomplish what you set out to do and feel like it's presentable.

Martin Atkins tweeted something or other recently about the drive that people have to be excellent musicians. Like a drummer wanting to be "as good as X." What he said essentially was...forget it. You will never be as good as X...and in the meantime life is passing you buy. Get out of fucking bed and be the best you that you already are and get something done. Otherwise...you will be demoralized and spend your lifetime noodling in your basement never getting to where you want to be.

Certainly this doesn't mean giving up trying to get better or working your craft...but there is some degree of...you only can work with what you have. Making significant improvement will be slow. So either give up or make what you have work. Not a bad philosophy for life in general in point of fact.

What I could give two shits about:
-jazz
-latin/afrocuban music
-crazy fast double bass metal
-crazy complicated progressive music (Applicable quote from last night's rehearsal "Rush were fascists." -RS)

What I care about:
-looking like I know what I'm doing
-feeling like I know what I'm doing
-playing some good old fashioned pop, punk, rock with other humans
-pushing myself a LITTLE bit, but not so far that it really hurts physically or emotionally
-learning more songs

Near the start of playing the drums I said that my drum heros were Dave Hower, Gina Schock, and Tre Cool. I've mastered some of those beats now...and I still say that's who I like to listen to. I've learned to appreciate Bonham...but Pert, Moon, or the billion others out there I'm supposed to like. Meh.

I'm guess I'm lucky because my goals probably line up well with my abilities and potential for improvement. Maybe I'm settling. But how is it settling to like what you like and not be interested in what you aren't interested in.

So probably some time soon I should really try to stop feeling bad about not being good at things that I don't give two shits about.

More Week Nine

So I'd almost given up on week 9...like decided not to turn in anything. I sent the instructor some questions and he sent me a totally canned response that amounted to...practice more. Not helpful.

I think what I've been struggling with in large part is not having good audio examples. The lesson basically shows only a measure or a few of each part of the pattern. I'm sorry...that's just not a long enough loop. And pulling other examples from the world is hard because they invariably have all of the parts together...not in isolation.

Then I found this:





Super great stuff. Just what I needed. And he's also very reassuring about...this is going to take a while to learn.

So I wish I'd found this days ago...but at least I have it now. I think that I'm going to try to learn JUST the bell part and turn that in tonight (going out of town for the weekend). But seeing this makes me feel like it MIGHT be worth revisiting some day...whereas last night I was thinking that I would avoid anything like this forever on.

Maybe I'm just not at the right level for this class...but I don't REALLY think that's true. I think I probably am at a fine level for the class. I just don't think the care is being taken to deal with unfamiliar topics. I thought that the very first week when supposedly they were introducing reading music for the very first time and by the end of the week had us doing a super complicated piece. I already knew how to read, so that wasn't hard for me...but for someone else it would have been ridiculous. And now we're on the things that feel ridiculous to me. And there doesn't seem to be any acknoweldgement of that. To me, if you can already do this stuff...why are you even taking the class? So in that case, it ought to have more consideration of things being hard for people.

Fundamentals Week 9

So the assignment this week is to make up a drum part for an Afrocuban playalong...and I've pretty much convinced myself that I can't do it because I can't get the key Afrocuban patterns, Bembe and Abakwa:



I just watched the first assignment turned in my one of my classmates. As far as I can tell...he didn't use the patterns AT ALL. He just made up another part. So I'm totally doing that. Flunk me...whatevs...it ain't for credit and this shit is making me sad. Ask a fish to climb a tree and they will feel stupid all their lives. I'm all for challenging myself...but I'm done climbing trees.

On a side note...feeling overwhelmed and stupid after trying to learn those Afrocuban patterns I sat down at the drums and played the actual music that my actual bands play. I haven't been practicing any of it for months because I've been kind of demoralized about drumming in general. I had a great practice session and nailed lots of stuff and totally felt aok. Thank god.

Fundamentals Week 9

This week is Afrocuban...which I suck at as much as I do Latin. I am white to the core.

This week's assignments seem pretty much impossible. I'm not kidding. It's ridiculous. Just stupid four way independence. And we aren't reading our part we've writing it. I've also got less time this week too because I'll be out of town this weekend. So I've got through Friday night to make it happen. I'm pretty sure what I turn in will be sad, sad. I'm sure the instructor thinks I'm lazy and not trying hard enough. Blargh.

Observations About Drum Skills

The entire Berklee experience has been a bit demoralizing. As low as my confidence in my drumming was before...I realize now that I'm not even as good as I thought. One thing in particular that has come to my attention is that I have a horrible internal sense of time. I used to think I was pretty good at this...but no.

CJ recently started playing "Blown Away" and there's this part where in the middle of the song the bass line hangs its ass out with nothing but the vocal and I've been painfully aware that I really don't know if I'm slowing down or speeding up or holding steady. I just pray for the drums to come back in two measures later. And that's what I've noticed with the Berklee lessons too. For instance, this week the assignment is a pretty easy 12/8 tune. But there is a 3 beat (well, 9 beat I suppose) cymbal wash and then a "10,11,12" fill into the song. I totally lose my place during the cymbal wash...so that when the rest of the instruments come in on the next downbeat I really have no idea what the tempo is anymore. I have to make micro-adjustments to get with the recording. By the end of the first full measure I'm with the recording and can keep with it pretty well.

I'm used to either playing with a live band (who will adjust to my changes in tempo) or with a recording that has the drums on it (so that I can stay with the drummer the whole time). But if you remove the element of someone else playing...I get lost. I don't have an internal "pulse".

This is a really bizarre thing to realize after having played for 6 years. The solution is to play with a click more often and work with turning it on and off and see if I stay with the imaginary clicks. This is hard, of course, because that means not playing along to recordings...which is kind of boring. Short of just doing exercises...I suppose I could play the drum charts for songs from my books along to a click but without the backing tracks.

Bleh.

Fundamentals Week 8

This week is 12/8 (and other compound time signatures) and flams. The assignment is shorter than in recent weeks and more improvisational, though the etude is a little tricky. This week shouldn't be quite as stressful as other recent weeks.

Only four weeks left after this week.
Week 9, Afro-Cuban 6/8: Afro Blue
Week 10, Jazz Shuffle: Things Ain’t What they used to be
Week 11, Swinging: April in Paris
Week 12, Cha Cha: Naima

None of these are styles that I am familiar with and I suspect I will be frustrated from here on out.

I was thinking this weekend that it may not be in the cards for me to be a certain kind of drummer...and that maybe I ought to focus on improving what I CAN do and what I could potentially be good at. Something I think that might be a really good idea is just nailing down my sense of time. I've realized that I used to think that I keep good time...but I don't. I don't have a strong internal pulse. Working with a metronome more would probably be a really good thing...in particular...starting an exercise or song by playing with the click...then turning the click off maybe with a foot...and trying to keep the pulse...then turn the click back on and see if I stayed with it. It's such a simple thing...but really a great skill to have.

I've also been playing along with some Pixies tunes and would like to nail down being able to play those songs. They aren't hard but there are challenging things in them that I'd like to master. Trompe le Monde is a song that really challenges me and I think truly learning to play it would be an attainable and useful exercise.

Anyway...I'd just like to get back to enjoying playing rather than having it make me feel bad. After this class is over I was to think about where to go next and maybe trying to get back to playing for fun and just getting better at what I already can do. It would be nice, for instance, to gain confidence playing The Drain songs.

Fundamentals Week 7

We're on the home stretch now. This week is half time shuffle (and also paradiddles) and the assignment is Rosanna by Toto:


I can play the song. I can't play the song AS WRITTEN...but if you asked me to play it on stage at High Noon ten minutes from now I could do it kinda. I'm having a little trouble both with playing the hi hat as fast as I'm supposed to, keeping it up for 9+ pages, and getting it along with the bass drum. Bass drum + snare I can play pretty much correctly.

There's an etude which I'm totally going to not play right and I kind of don't care.

For sure my attitude has shifted on the course...probably for the worse in terms of playing well...but probably for the better in mental health terms. I'm still doing the work...but trying not to take it so hard that I'm not at a certain level. I'm where I am...and that's the only place I can be.

Fundamentals Week Six

This week is samba...which it turns out bossa nova is a variety of even though we treated it separately. It'll be another rough week...though maybe not as bad as I thought. For some reason the variations in the lesson seem more intuitive to me than I'd expected. We'll see.

While I think this course was valuable, I don't think that I'm putting enough time into it to get as much out of it as I might. And I feel myself starting to hate it a little bit and hoping for the day when it will be over. So it was an interesting experiment, but I think it is just too hard on me emotionally.

I'm not sure how I get into a daily practice that is sustainable. It is very much like exercise of any kind...you know it is good for you but you have a hard time motivating to do it. And the less you do it the less able you feel to do it...and so on.

I want to advance my skills and to be respected. But at the end of the day...it really just needs to be fun...right? I mean no one gives a shit that I'm doing this...it's supposed to be for fun. What a wonderful thing it would be to actually have fun with no judgements on if I was good enough or not? Pixies gets close to that (minus vocals anyway) and this is why I love it so...but it is also why I discount it as "too easy".

I'm pretty much inconsolable and the architect of my own misery.

Fundamentals Week Five

This week is bossa nova. My talent in the latin rhythms is not...good. But of all of them bossa nova is the one that I get the best. Probably because it is relatively simple, relatively slow, and ubiquitous in American culture.

Last week's lesson was horrible on so many levels...but I take heart in the fact that everyone else in the class thought it was horrible too. I got a C+...which is probably the first time in my life that has happened (I failed an English paper once for not following directions...on purpose...but I've never gotten a C before I don't think...of course...I'm probably blocking out Nuclear Engineering grad school now that I think of it). His comments were not helpful. I made quite clear that I was struggling with the assignment and his comments amounted to "you did it wrong"...which I had already full well admitted. The professorship is minimal here.

And again I have to say that the care and organization of the course is subpar. For instance...it was implied this week that we had already studied accents. We have not. Accents were thrown into an assignment...but they were never explained or discussed. Same for dynamics in general...they've been thrown at us...but not truly examined. In this week's lesson it says we will start 32nd notes this week...only we started them last week. And I got zinged for playing both etudes last week when we were only supposed to play one...well THAT wasn't made clear AT ALL. Oh...and in some places he'll say to play things at 50 bpm...then somewhere else it'll say 60...for the same portion of the assignment. Just really bad editing and consistency checks all around. It'd be ok if this was cheap...but it isn't at all. Lazy...sloppy.

More Thoughts on Berklee

The feedback that I've gotten from the Berkleee instructor has been strange. He picks up on strange things that don't seem all that important to me and misses things that seem like a big deal to me.

I particularly liked when he told me to work on better synching of my video and audio files. Yeah...they aren't synched dude...it's one file.

This week (last week's assignment) he said I should try to have fun with the song. So...have you ever tried to have fun while reading sheet music that you aren't familiar with? It's hard. When I know a song well I can have fun. When I'm reading tiny dots 3 feet away I have to focus. We only have a week to learn these songs. If all I had to do was kind of play them like them seem I could have fun. But if you want me to read them note for note...well it's reading dude.

Anyway...all of this reinforces to me that the feedback portion of this course isn't that useful except in that it forces deadlines.

Fundamentals Week Four

This week it is Swingtown (and, obstensibly 32nd notes, though ironically there aren't any of those in Swingtown).

I've been trying to learn to play this song literally for years.

Here's a former Berklee student pulling it off quite well


There are two hard things in this song for me.

The main riff:

The 2nd bass note is on an off beat so to speak, which makes it a real independence issue. Beyond that...this is pretty fast...and goes on forever. It's a long time for me anyway...five minutes of a strenuous pattern for me.

The fills:

I probably can get this. I'm just not used to playing fills at all and the "ruff" and triplet figure isn't something I'm used to.

This is the kind of song that makes me want to cry. At the moment I can play the main riff at about 60% speed. If I drop the "off" bass note...I can play the riff full speed...but it is exhausting. I know that these things just take practice...but it feels like it takes me longer than it should. It literally feels like my right foot is retarded and acting on its own. The control is all over the place.

I am who I am and I am where I am and all I can do is keep trying. I think that my fear and shame makes me avoid practicing...and that's why these things take so long. And I have to remember that I've only been at this for 6 years...and as an adult with obligations. I don't have the benefit of endless hours of being a teen with a drum kit. Patience. Persistance. And in the end...it is progress to value, not perfection.

Additional Week Three Reflections

In addition to all of this my week three thoughts are this...

1. Structure in learning is good
2. Accountability in learning is good
3. Going at your own pace...but with a deadline...is good
4. Working on things on your own...before you have to show an instructor...is good
5. Instructor feedback is good...but really most things you can critique yourself if you take a video and watch it back.
6. My method of listen...read (or write and then read)...practice slow...is totally legit and I should keep up with it. Screw those guys who seem to pull shit out of their asses.
7. It is good to have a defined time to work on something...say a week...and then to give up. Otherwise you spend forever trying to make it perfect and get demoralized. Making it an assignment with a start date and an end date is good.
8. This class, while super great and perhaps worth the value, is over priced

So where does that lead me?

I think that I really, really hate private lessons. I don't like being put on the spot in a lesson (do it now!) and I never practice between lessons, making them essentially useless. So lessons are kind of out unless I come to a place where I have something specific that I want to work on and can't do it without feedback.

I think that...once this class is over...I should do the following.

1. Pull out all of my playalong books. Might want to try to find a Latin playalong book...and maybe a Jazz one...cause I'm missing those key genres.
2. Develop a "syllabus" that is basically that I will work on one song per week. Mix up the genres so that it is a different book each week...Nirvana one week, Jimi Hendrix the next, then Funk...etc
3. Start the "lesson" on Monday (or Sunday)...do the song for a week...video tape at the end of the week...review the video. At the end of the week...lesson over...start next song.
4. Throughout the week...use any online resources or recordings to help learn the part...just like I would for any song
5. Treat the whole thing just like I'm paying for a class. If I find that I need it...I MIGHT even be able to hire an advanced drummer to watch the videos online each week and give me a critique (perhaps half the cost of a traditional lesson?)...but I don't know that I need this...and certainly not right away.

Can I hold myself to this? Who knows? But it seems like trying for a while is worth the $1200 I'd pay Berklee? Right?

So that's where my head is going at the moment. We'll see how I feel in 9 more weeks.

Fundamentals Week Three

This week is Cold Sweat by James Brown (Clyde Stubblefield on drums) with a "fat back" beat (the back beat is displaced sometimes to the "and of 4" rather than being always on 2 and 4)...ghost notes, 8th and 16th notes, and some marginally strange hi hat opens.

Here's the Cold Sweat riff:


At first blush I thought I'd get this right away...but the placement of the ghost notes and the bass and hi hat foot ended up being just counterintuitive enough to give me a fit. I nearly learned the riff wrong...but then realized what I was doing. It didn't help that, in the video demo, the instructor added about 3 more sets of ghost notes. My instinct is to do that too...and maybe Clyde did also...but I thought this was not really a very nice thing to do in the video. He's adding things that aren't on the written page and he didn't warn us that he was going to do that. I don't think this is a useful way to teach reading. Reading means playing what is on the page. Step one. The NEXT step is adding extras.

This touches on my general feeling about the course...is that they are a bit careless sometimes. They don't make sure that what is on the videos is what is on the page...in the case of the first week etude he's playing a different song than we were given! This is just sloppy prep work on the part of the organizers. And while I feel like I can adjust to these mistakes...it just makes the learning process harder. Especially if you were new to reading...and SUPPOSEDLY this class is in part to teach you to read (though I'd say that if you couldn't read prior to taking this course you would not be able to make it through). The pre-req for the class is one year of playing. Shit...after one year of playing I would NOT have had the skills to do this stuff. They really are expecting way more experience and/or training.

Second point, they don't tell you when the chats are with enough lead time to plan. And the chats aren't very useful.

Third point, your interaction with the instructor is minimal here. That's kind of what sells the course...that you are going to get this individual feedback...but it is pretty generic.

Overall, it is VERY apparent that this course runs on auto-pilot and that we aren't much of a priority to the instructor (if he's even really the one on the other end).

That said, the course is fine. I really like the format of short video...printed material. The pacing of the videos are pretty good too...though a hair advanced (he doesn't slow down much).

They used to require you to buy Playalong books and don't anymore...which is nice from a cost perspective...but I've really benefitted from having the Amazing Slow Downer cds that have both the track with drums and without. I think that in their recommended resources they should recommend that you either buy the Playalong books...or get the Amazing Slow Downer program. I keep debating if I should buy it. It's like 50 bucks...but works, in theory, on all mp3s. They have a free version, but you only get the first 30 seconds of the song or the first few songs of a cd.

Anyway...back to Cold Sweat. I was pretty discouraged by Tuesday morning. I'd worked on it a bit Sunday (before the assignment was given, but I had the Playalong version) and on Monday and then on Tuesday while I was waiting for my oil to be changed. I avoided practicing on Tuesday night and actually went to bed at 8:30pm because I was so depressed. On Wednesday morning I was avoiding it to...then decided that I really ought to try to play it once. I put the Slow Downer on 50% and, to my surprise, got the part. Then did 70%...80%...90%...and 100%. I got it. I was shocked. I REALLY had thought I was going to have to rewrite the part and apologize to him and say that my skills weren't up to the challenge and that I just couldn't get it. In that way that things happen...if I can keep the pattern in my head and hands/feet over the next few days...it'll seem easy by Sunday when I record. I might even record on Friday or Saturday and start the next lesson on Saturday/Sunday (next week is Swingtown...a song that I've been trying to learn to play and failing for at least two years now).

It's just a weird thing. To be totally convinced that you'll never get something at 7am in the morning...and 30 minutes later to have conquored it. I'm supposed to pause and pat myself on the back now...because...really wow. I don't know if it'll always fall into place in a week...but I guess that I should have faith that if you slow something down enough...break it down...and go over and over it...eventually you WILL get it. We'll see how Swingtown goes...it has been sticking its tongue out at me for a while now.

Fundamentals Week Two

The second week of class is about the 2 beat (bass on 1, 3...snare/hi hat on 2, 4). This is my go-to basic beat...so not that hard (though of course there is room to improve). The song is Flashlight by Parliament. A great groove...but nothing technically difficult. The trick is in keeping the groove consistent for five and a half minutes.

I was pretty stressed out about class last week and had to take a step back and chill out. This is all meant for personal growth and fun...there's no need to expect perfection and to stress myself out (and then feel bad about myself) if it isn't attained. Take away what you can but be realistic. It isn't a miracle.

Got a B+ on the first assignment. The comments were basically to keep the sticks closer to the heads between hits (the intro part of Separate Ways I was pulling them away, which I'd only do in a wide open part like that. I kind of reject the comment. I understand the benefits of economy of motion...but theatrics isn't a horrible thing when performing...and that's what that felt like more than a mistake)...and that I rushed the prechorus, which I knew. He complimented me for getting back into time though. His comments in general for eveyone fell into about 4 streams and were, though personalized, generic (copy and pasted). I don't think this is going to get too detailed. On the other hand, I suppose that people tend to make the same mistakes.

Anyway, this week's lesson feels more laid back. We'll see how it goes when we get into the Latin shit.

Fundamentals Week One

So I am taking an online college course (Fundamentals of Drum Kit) on drums through Berklee School of Music. Monday was my first day. So far I really like the format. The concept of having assignments due is a little terrifying, but so far so good. The first lesson was a lot of basics that I already had down...but plenty that was challenging too. It reassured me that I have a solid musical background (if you went into this course not knowing how to read music, I think you'd be lost, even though the course is supposed to cover that). It DOES make me a little nervous for future lessons...because once we hit the stuff that I don't know it'll feel crazy fast. They aren't waiting for anyone to catch up...let's put it that way. And I will pretty much need to work on this every night of the week to get my assignments turned in on time. Here's the topic outline and the assignment songs for each week:

Week 1, Basics: Separate Ways
Week 2, Basics: Flashlight
Week 3, Time and Ghost Notes: Cold Sweat
Week 4, Single Stroke Rolls and 32nds: Swingtown
Week 5, Double stroke open and bossa nova: The Girl From Ipanema
Week 6, Samba: variations
Week 7, Half-time suffle: Rosanna
Week 8, Compound meter grooves: Spellbound
Week 9, Afro-Cuban 6/8: Afro Blue
Week 10, Jazz Shuffle: Things Ain’t What they used to be
Week 11, Swinging: April in Paris
Week 12, Cha Cha: Naima

The format is...several videos by the instructor on various topics with text, sheet music and audio files to accompany. There's a discussion question...a weekly live chat (which I can probably only make some of the time due to work)...and two songs to learn (an etude and a pop song), record, and turn in. The first song is simple...but has challenging elements.

Here's the hardest part of the song for me...though this part is in the "extra credit" portion of the assignment.

Like I said, if I didn't already read music...and read DRUM music...it would be SUPER hard. As it is I'm gonna have to work on the song a bunch. I already have the book that most of these songs come out of...along with a slow-downer cd which will help...so I can work ahead a bit. I've been trying to learn Swingtown for years...so they aren't easy. The Latin grooves terrify me too...but of course that's why I'm doing this...to be challenged and go to the next level. I really like being able to work alone and at my own pace. So far they seem to do a good job with the pacing and materials (better than other online lessons I've seen)...so I think it will be good. Guaranteed freakout at some point in the next 12 weeks though. Don't say I didn't tell you so. It will probably happen the week of Feb 6th...just saying...I know myself but always forget.